Mrs Arafat's Bank Accounts Probed

BBC ^ | 2-11-2004

[blam]

Mrs Arafat's bank accounts probed

Suha, who married the Palestinian leader in 1992, lives in Paris

French prosecutors are looking into alleged multi-million dollar transfers into the bank accounts of the wife of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Officials have confirmed reports of an inquiry into the financial transactions of Paris-based Suha Arafat.

They acted after the Bank of France alerted them to transfers of nine million euros ($11.5m) from Switzerland to two of Mrs Arafat's accounts.

Prosecutors say the investigation is at a preliminary stage.

It was launched by the Paris public prosecutor last October after the Bank of France reported that nearly $1.27m was being transferred on a regular basis from Switzerland to Mrs Arafat's accounts in Paris.

Officials said the alleged transfers were also confirmed by a government anti-money laundering body.

The prosecutor's office said it was checking transfers made between July 2002 and July 2003 into Mrs Arafat's accounts at Arab Bank and French bank BNP.

Satirical magazine

The investigation only came to light this week in the satirical French weekly Canard Enchaine.

Officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the probe was preliminary to determine whether there was sufficient grounds to take investigations further.

The Palestinian leader has in the past rejected allegations of financial corruption with the Palestinian Authority.

Mrs Arafat could not be contacted for comment. According to the Associated Press news agency, a lawyer who has represented Mrs Arafat in the past said he had not been approached by her about the probe.

[blam]

These are your tax dollars that the US government gives to Arafat for the Palestinian people. (Yes, the same ones who cheered after 9-11)

[Diogenesis]

Not all the money when to her. Some may have gone to the DNC.

[Chris Talk]

Rumor is that at least $1 billion, possibly up to $3 billion, has been skimmed by Arafat personally out of aid from the USA, Canada, Norway, and the EU etc. over the years. Suha recently became a French citizen.

If Arabs/Muslims are as great as they say they are, why is it that if any of them ever get a few dollars they leave to go live among the Christian or post-Christian infidels.

[Paul Atreides]

I bet that's the first probing she's had since Hillary.

[blam]

Why was €1m a month sent to Arafat's wife?

France launches inquiry into suspect bank transfers as Israelis say EU money went to help suicide bombers

Jon Henley in Paris
Thursday February 12, 2004
The Guardian (UK)

French public prosecutors said yesterday they had opened a money-laundering inquiry into suspect transfers totalling some €9m (£6m) into Paris bank accounts held by the wife of the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat.

The preliminary inquiry, which will determine whether a full investigation is warranted, was launched after the Bank of France and Tracfin, the French anti-laundering agency, noticed regular payments of about €1m a month entering Suha Arafat's accounts. An official said the money, from "a Swiss institution", was paid into two separate accounts at the Arab Bank and the Banque Nationale de Paris in the name of Mrs Arafat, who lives in Paris.

The inquiry, which began in October last year, is confined to payments between July 2002 and July 2003, he said, although the transfers started about a year earlier.

According to the satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaîné, €2m of the money subsequently left Mrs Arafat's accounts and was transferred to Alberto Pinto, an interior decorator much in demand among the international jet set. Mr Pinto's office denies he ever worked for the Palestinian leader or his family. Suha Arafat lives at an undisclosed Paris address with her daughter Zahwa and Yasser Arafat's mother, Raymonda Tawil.

The family has been reported as occupying an entire floor at the luxury Bristol Hotel, though this is denied by hotel management. She is also said to receive some $100,000 (£53,000) a month from the Palestinian Authority.

Word emerged in 1992 of Mr Arafat's secret marriage to the much younger Suha, whose uncovered hair and chic western clothes shocked many Palestinians. She rarely visits Palestine, has been criticised for leading an extravagant lifestyle, and has caused her husband many headaches by alleging corruption, cronyism and human rights abuses in his Palestinian Authority.

Investigators from the European Union's anti-fraud office are currently in Jerusalem examining the authority's accounts after allegations last year that part of the EU's annual aid package to Palestine - which totals about €350m a year - may have been misappropriated.

The EU's concerns arise mainly from an audit of the authority's finances carried out last year by the International Monetary Fund. In September 2003 the chief auditor, Karim Nashashibi, alleged at a press conference in Dubai that as much as $900m had been diverted between 1995 and 2000 into "a special account controlled by Yasser Arafat".

IMF and EU officials say that because of the way the Palestinian leadership has done business over many years, relying on a web of companies to generate money and move cash around when Palestinian political groups were fighting Israel from exile, it is difficult to estimate what proportion of the diverted funds has been misappropriated. The investigation by the EU's anti-fraud office has also taken in documents seized by the Israeli army during its reoccupation of Palestinian cities two years ago. The Israelis say the documents show that EU money went to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, responsible for suicide bombings.

The Palestinian Authority's representative in Paris, told Le Canard Enchaîné that Mrs Arafat was not aware of the inquiry and said she "does not answer journalists' questions". The authority's Paris office promised to pass a message to Mrs Arafat, but refused to say how she might be contacted. The Guardian received no response to its questions last night.

Mr Arafat has always rejected allegations of corruption in the authority. Yet in recent years it has suffered a fall in foreign donor money amid allegations that some of the cash has been siphoned off by corrupt officials or diverted to militants carrying out the suicide bombing campaign against Israel.

The Americans and Europeans forced a new finance minister, Salam Fayad, on Mr Arafat to establish more transparent management of Palestinian Authority finances. Mr Fayad made great strides and became the darling of foreign governments in the face of bitter resentment from Mr Arafat.

However, corruption is still rampant and there is widespread disillusionment among ordinary Palestinians at the relative luxury that many Fatah leaders live in. On Saturday, more than 300 members of Mr Arafat's ruling Fatah movement resigned collectively, demanding greater democracy and an end to all corruption.